An Extraordinary EmailWhat triggered this column was the message from a reader who came across a story I wrote 10 years ago about the world's greatest banker. She, too, knew this bank and had some fascinating new information about him. Here goes:

Bob Hemmings is one of the great men of direct marketing. Now in his 90s and proprietor of the Hemmings IV Direct agency in Pasadena, Calif., Hemmings is dapper, intense, powerfully built, immediately recognizable with his Adolph Menjou mustache and bone crusher of a handshake.

In his younger days, an employer of Hemmings was Frank Brock, president of the First Bank of Troy, Idaho. Troy's population in 1960 was 514; Brock's bank had 6,000 active accounts—12 times as many people who lived in the town. He had customers in 45 states, and around the world as far away as Pago Pago, American Samoa.

What was Brock's secret?

Hemmings recalled that Brock knew precisely what business he was in. "I am in the financial services business to help provide finances for my customers—from the cradle to the grave," he said.

Brock once made a loan to a man who had robbed the bank five years before. He was caught and served three years in prison. Brock said: "He has learned his lesson. I don't hold past mistakes against him. He is a much more stable individual now."

According to Hemmings, Frank Brock knew practically all of his customers by their first names; whenever a good loan customer ran into financial difficulty, the bank carried him—without dunning notices or pilling up interest charges—until he was back on his feet.

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